Acedia
Over the centuries, Christians everywhere have experienced an apathy of body, mind, and spirit. From the monk who keeps checking the time until the day is over to the college student who aimlessly surfs the internet all day, this apathy can affect anyone, regardless of their spiritual maturity.
This spiritual and physical apathy is called acedia. Acedia isn’t quite depression, as there are a few differences. Some might call it a “spiritual desert,” but it feels deeper than that. First, acedia is a distinct lack of feeling anything. There’s no happiness, no sadness, no anger – just apathy, about everything. Second, there’s no apparent cause. With depression, a cause – either biology or trauma – can be found. The person who suffers from acedia doesn’t care about anything, doesn’t care that he doesn’t care, and often doesn’t care to find a solution.
For the past three years, my spiritual life has been marked by bouts of acedia. Even though I was the youth minister of my church, my own spiritual life was anything but exemplary. I taught about the importance of prayer while my own prayer life was nearly non-existent. I tried to teach my students the importance of spending time reading their Bibles while I only cracked mine open to make their lessons. The only thing I did was to read spiritually edifying books, which wasn’t quite a substitute for my own relationship with God through prayer and reading Scripture.
Tired
Eventually, I stopped reading spiritual books. I didn’t want to read about atonement theories, or how the Church needed to change in order to fulfill the Great Commission, or how God was still speaking through preachers today. I didn’t want to struggle through the Church Fathers. I was tired, mentally and spiritually and physically, and I just didn’t have the energy to read. Before long I didn’t even want to browse /r/Christianity, which is my favorite online community. I had entirely lost interest in God and his place in my life had been given to other things – relationships, work, school.
I knew something was wrong, but I had no idea how to fix it. Ultimately, there was only one thing that could heal the damage that had been done to my faith by all the things that had happened. If I could just get even the smallest portion of my relationship with God back, I had faith that Jesus could restore what had been lost. But by this point, I didn’t even know how to pray.
Spark
One day, at a complete loss as to what I should do, I decided to force myself to read a book called How Christians Pray. My friend (and the author, Bishop Kenneth Myers) had sent me the copy as a gift. Since I’d quit reading any books related to Christianity around the time he sent it to me, the book had been on my shelf for over a year, untouched. The book probably saved my faith.
When my faith was nearly dead, the book gave it new life by teaching me to pray. I grew up thinking that prayer had to be my own words, or it didn’t matter to God. But when I had no words for God, I couldn’t pray. I closed my eyes and sat silently for a few seconds and then gave up, thinking “What’s the use?”
Bishop Myers’s book taught me that I could “cheat” on my prayers. I didn’t have to use my own words. His book, which covers the Lord’s Prayer, showed me that I could pray someone else’s words for myself – and whose words could be better than Jesus’ own words? Those words became my lifeline. I said them often; I said them passionately; I said them hoping that my Heavenly Father could hear my mental plea to rescue me from my own apathy.
Communion
Eventually, I started praying the Daily Office in the Episcopalian Book of Common Prayer. The words of Christians across the ages helped me pray when I didn’t have words of my own. Prayer became a place of rest and communion with God instead of being me stumbling through a few awkward attempts before giving up. It was through this communion that, slowly, I found myself being drawn back to God.
That’s not to say that I’m completely better now. I’m not. I still struggle to pray as I should. But now, I know that I’m not alone in this struggle. Christians throughout history have fought to pray to God, to pray without ceasing. When I can’t feel God, I know that it’s not the first time that a Christian has been unable to feel God. It’s not a new thing. I know what I have to do – I continue to pray, knowing that my faith isn’t about me and doesn’t rely on me, but is centered on Jesus Christ, the Son of God. I have a Heavenly Father who hears the prayers of those who seek them. I have the Holy Spirit, which intercedes for me when I cannot.
All I have to do is pray.